I know, I know. It has been way too long a time since I’ve brought any CBA news to you, but can you blame me? Since the February 2nd meeting, it has been a long and convoluted process with heavy doses of drama.

Let me walk you through a timeline that begins with the February 2nd meeting and leads to today, Sunday, March 15th, the day before everything must be finalized to avoid canceling preseason games and delaying the season.

Read the previous newsletter for coverage of the February 2nd meeting.

The past month and a half has been the most outwardly contentious time in the CBA negotiations to date. For the first time, we saw a real rift between the players, more specifically within the Executive Committee.

In early March, KP and Stewie sent a letter to the WNBPA Executive Director, Terri Jackson, stating they have “serious concerns about the PA’s handling of the negotiations,” mainly citing a lack of transparency and a lack of player involvement in the process.

Terri shared the letter with the rest of the Executive Committee, which highlighted the divide even more, as other members of the EC stated they were content with how the union was handling the negotiation process.

Naturally, this garnered very mixed reactions, with some saying KP and Stewie are only concerned about themselves, high-paid vets, and rookies, while others think Nneka and Terri want to strike for political purposes.

The common refrain we heard from Stewie and KP during this time was, “We are now in a revenue-sharing model, so we lose money if we don’t play,” and “we want to play.”

It was an interesting time for them to send this out espeically as it came right after the WNBA proposed on March 1st that included

With these stipulations, the top players and top rookies will be well taken care of, which includes Kelsey Plum and Breanna Stewart. Both KP and Stewie will be million-dollar players.

This is important to note because with this setup, 1–3 max or supermax players would take up most of the salary cap, which would result in little growth in the salaries of the “middle class.” This means those on vet minimums and those who stand to see a decrease in their salary because of the tighter cap (think Natasha Cloud makes $200K now, which is the max; she will probably not be offered a max contract on any team other than an expansion team). This also includes rookies who are not star players and who won’t be eligible for these max and supermax contracts after their fourth year.

Fighting for a larger salary cap ensures that the middle class is taken care of.

This cap also makes it impossible to have multiple stars on your team without them taking significant pay cuts, effectively killing the SuperTeam (Aces, New York, etc). The league wants more parity because they believe it’s good for the growth of the game. I personally believe the superteam era (Aces vs Liberty) revived the league as we started seeing increased viewership and ticket sales because of those battles. I’m biased, of course :)

But forreal, think Indiana Fever. There is no way they will be able to keep Caitlin Clark, Kesley Mitchell, and Aliyah Boston if CC and AB are eligible for the max/supermax at the same time. KM would be the odd one out.

Post Leak Statement:

Thoughts from other players:

Since Tuesday, March 10th, the WNBA, WNBPA, Executive Committee, their staffs (WNBA and WNBPA), and lawyers have been meeting in 12+ hour sessions, hammering out the details of the CBA with the aim of completing a final term sheet. Remember, March 9th was the fake ass deadline Adam Silver gave to have the CBA term sheet completed.

Just like spending hours in the group meeting rooms of your university’s library, they have come together to iron out every detail of the CBA. Notably, this is what they should have been doing in the six months since the CBA expired, but the WNBA did not respond to the WNBPA for six weeks, and also came to the February 2nd meeting empty-handed. Of course, we know that this is often a successful tactic companies use during labor negotiations, but it seems to have backfired a bit.

For constant updates, follow WNBA reporters Annie Costabile (Front Office Sports), Alexa Philippou (ESPN), Jackie Powell (The Next), and Doug Feinberg (AP), who have also been camped outside the negotiations, giving us on-the-ground reporting.

The first day of negotiations began rather randomly, with the WNBPA and the WNBA (and their staffs) arriving in Manhattan to begin a meeting that most thought would be a couple of hours. 10 hours later, it began to look like real work was starting to be done on the CBA. The goal, Cathy said, was to get a labor agreement or a handshake deal done to move forward with the season.

EC members present for this meeting were: President Nneka Ogwumike, VPs Breanna Stewart and Alyesha Clark, and Treasurer Bri Turner. (Elizabeth Williams is playing overseas, Kelsey Plum is in PR playing with Team USA, and Phee was at a Cardi B Concert).

Rev Sharing and Housing continue to be the main sticking points.

An important thing to mention about these discussions is that neither side has been providing any concrete updates about their progress. We know what the main sticking points are, what still needs to be negotiated, and that’s about it.

An extremely funny thing happened on Thursday. Holly Rowe shared the CBA updates from the WNBA side and forgot to crop out the line identifying the source. The update showed there was some movement in the salary cap. Remember, the WNBPA’s proposal was at 9 mil, and the WNBA was around 5.75 mil.

Napheesa Collier joined the negotiations in person on Friday, and Alyesha Clark and Bri Turner returned to negotiations on Sunday after leaving on Friday.

Sharing and housing are the main topics, as always. For the first time ever, the WNBA proposal for revenue share amounts to more 15% of gross revenue.

It seems progress has been made on the core designation, minimum standards for facilities, and retirement benefits. These things are important to nail down because they influence the salary cap and total revenue share percentages.

If the negotiations go beyond Monday, they will have to begin delaying preseason, training camp, and possibly the season itself. If they do sign by Monday, here is how April will go:

Check out some of the cool podcasts, videos, reads, and fashion I saw this week.